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https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/COUCHDB-2052?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel&focusedCommentId=13893457#comment-13893457
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Benjamin Young commented on COUCHDB-2052:
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There's a lot of work being done in the Hypermedia API world around just this
issue. The response can carry that information in a less-meta way by using good
ole hyperlinks. :)
There are several options here (and it's a growing list):
* Hypermedia Application Layer (HAL) -
http://stateless.co/hal_specification.html
* Hydra - http://www.markus-lanthaler.com/hydra/
* Collection+JSON - http://amundsen.com/media-types/collection/
More general info: http://amundsen.com/hypermedia/
Using Hypermedia is far more resilient than using "magic strings" that a human
has to look up and hard code meaning for into their client-code...which is what
we do now. Using a known Hypermedia format (there are loads more than those 3
JSON-focused ones), provide a shared foundation and community that can grow
collectively, CouchDB (and friends) can all participate, and we get a wider set
of tools, developers, conferences, etc interested in our API...or that's the
idea. ;)
Thanks for bringing this up in any case, Jens!
> Add API for discovering feature availability
> --------------------------------------------
>
> Key: COUCHDB-2052
> URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/COUCHDB-2052
> Project: CouchDB
> Issue Type: Improvement
> Security Level: public(Regular issues)
> Components: HTTP Interface
> Reporter: Jens Alfke
>
> I propose adding to the response of "GET /" a property called "features" or
> "extensions" whose value is an array of strings, each string being an
> agreed-upon identifier of a specific optional feature. For example:
> {"couchdb": "welcome", "features": ["_bulk_get", "persona"]}, "vendor":
> …
> Rationale:
> Features are being added to CouchDB over time, plug-ins may add features, and
> there are compatible servers that may have nonstandard features (like
> _bulk_get). But there isn't a clear way for a client (which might be another
> server's replicator) to determine what features a server has. Currently a
> client looking at the response of a GET / has to figure out what server and
> version thereof it's talking to, and then has to consult hardcoded knowledge
> that version X of server Y supports feature Z.
> (True, you can often get away without needing to check, by assuming a feature
> exists but falling back to standard behavior if you get an error. But not all
> features may be so easy to detect — the behavior of an unaware server might
> be to ignore the feature and do the wrong thing, rather than returning an
> error — and anyway this adds extra round-trips that slow down the operation.)
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